The Word Became Flesh

Fr. Thomas G. Weinandy OFM Cap.: To behold God’s Incarnate Word is to behold the Father’s Incarnate Son.  As the Word and as the Son, Jesus Christ manifests the fullness of who God the Father is. 

In the Prologue of John’s Gospel, I believe the Evangelist presented his theological interpretation of Christmas, that is, of the Incarnation.

John first declares: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”  Since the Word was with God and was God, He existed before the beginning began, that is, before Creation.

Existing prior to when the beginning began, “all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.”  The reason the Word was the author of all that came to be is that “in him was life,” and that the “life was the light of men.”

Being the Word, he possessed the fullness of divine life, and so, he could bring to life all that came to be.  The Word’s godly life was the light of men, for he was the life-giving light wherein humankind could behold God.

For John, the Word’s life-giving light “shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”  This is an enigmatic statement, for it refers to a twofold darkness.

First, the Evangelist, in replicating the first phrase of the Book of Genesis, alludes to the dark nothingness prior to Creation, when no-thing existed.  That darkness could not overcome the Word’s life-giving light.  In speaking his “Word,” God said “‘Let there be light;’ and there was light.”  The first light was the life-giving light of God’s Word, and in the light of his life-giving Word, God creates all else that came to be.  The darkness of nothingness succumbed to the life-giving light of God’s Word.

Second, darkness entered into God’s good Creation – the darkness of sin and death.  This darkness, however, could not overcome the life-giving light of God’s Word, for the Word shines in this darkness as well.

For John, “the true light that enlightens every man was coming into the world.  He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world knew him not.”  Having been created by the life-giving Word, the light of that Word never departs the world.  Yet the darkness of the sin-marred world of humankind failed to perceive his presence.  Nonetheless, the true light that ever enlightens humankind was now, once again, coming into the world.

Moreover, the Word “came to his own home, and his own people received him not.”  Beginning with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the Word found a home among the Jews.  By means of a covenant, He made them His singular people.  The prophets spoke His words and foretold His coming, yet when He came, His very own people refused to acknowledge Him.  They knew Him not.

But to “all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God; who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.”  Only by receiving the Word, by believing in His name, do we become God’s children – not by way of natural means, by way of the flesh and the will of man, but rather, it is by the power of God.  Only through faith and the new birth in the Holy Spirit does one become a child of God.  But in whose “name” must one believe for this transformation to be achieved?

Here, John’s Prologue reaches its climax.

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth; we have beheld his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father.

Previously, God was present in the temple.  There he tabernacled among his people.  Now, the Word, who was with God and who is God before the beginning began, has come to exist as man, and He tabernacles in our very midst, as man.  It is through the weakness of our sin-marred flesh, that we behold his glory – the glory of the Cross and the splendor of His resurrection.  As God created all through His Word, so now the Father is re-creating His fallen Creation through His incarnate Word.  The Father is making a new beginning through His only begotten Son.

As the incarnate Father’s Word, He possesses the fullness of grace, that is, the fullness of the Father’s loving salvific kindness.  He is the author of humankind’s redemption.  Likewise, the Incarnate Word embodies the fullness of truth, and so dispels the lies of Satan.  Thus, “from his fullness have we all received, grace upon grace.”  In, through, and with the Father’s incarnate Word there is an abundance of mercy, kindness, and love. It cannot be exceeded.

The reason for this superabundance is that, while “the law was given through Moses, grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.”  Finally, we know who the Word incarnate is.  We now know the name in whom we are to believe so that we might become children of the Father.  His name is Jesus Christ.  Being named “Jesus” accentuates that the Word incarnated is “YHWH-Saves.”  The Word became flesh and dwells in our midst as our Savior.  Moreover, Jesus is the Christ – the long awaited and ever anticipated Spirit-filled Messiah.  God’s promises of old have now been fulfilled and in a manner that no one would have ever expected.

Likewise, “No one has ever seen God; the only Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has made him known.”  As the Word was ever with God and was God, and so makes the truth of God known, so the Son is God and is ever in the Father’s bosom, and so also makes Him known.

To behold God’s Incarnate Word is to behold the Father’s Incarnate Son.  As the Word and as the Son,  Jesus Christ manifests the fullness of who God the Father is.  To believe in the name of Jesus, the Son, is to become Spirit-filled children of the Father.  We are taken up into, and so dwell within the very life of the Trinity.  This is the joy and splendor of Christmas!

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AUTHOR

Fr. Thomas G. Weinandy, OFM, Cap.

Thomas G. Weinandy, OFM, a prolific writer and one of the most prominent living theologians, is a former member of the Vatican’s International Theological Commission. His newest book is the third volume of Jesus Becoming Jesus: A Theological Interpretation of the Gospel of John: The Book of Glory and the Passion and Resurrection Narratives.

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